


Vibrant

by WhisperOfTheDay



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: (which left me in pieces), (written and posted before i watched uprising), Brother-Sister Relationships, Canon Compliant, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Male-Female Friendship, Platonic Relationships, Pre-Movie, Relationship Study, aro Newt, i'll give this headcanon up when i'm dead, nonetheless, shatterdome as family, tightly packed with headcanons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-21
Updated: 2018-03-23
Packaged: 2019-04-05 16:37:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 3,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14048388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhisperOfTheDay/pseuds/WhisperOfTheDay
Summary: A story about finding common ground, regardless of the fact that said ground is breaking upart under their feet.





	1. Chapter 1

_"Now, Dr. Newton Geiszler of MIT- the owner of a doctorate and 4 honorary degrees in various biological fields, leading in artificial tissue replication and first to do in-depth study and systematic categorisation of Kaiju- will share his groundbreaking research on Kaiju's chemical make-up. Please, welcome-"_

 

The male voice in the speakers is replaced with applause as the man introduced comes up on the stage, in a jogging-like way, carrying neither papers nor tablet to read from. He's all cleaned up- white shirt, black vest, black tie- beaming like a 7 year old at Christmas, not knowing what else to do with his hands but awkwardly wave at the broad audience, until apparently deeming it stupid and putting his hand down. 

Mako smiles despite herself as the young man (quite _too_ young for 5 PhDs, to be honest) clumsily adjusts the microphone to his height, throwing irritated glares to the side of the platform at technicians, ears turning even more saturated colour. The gigantic screen on the wall behind lights up as he positions himself at the lectern, face illuminated by dozens of projectors. 

Sitting on the first row (a bit to the right from the middle, beside Pentecost-sama), she can see sweat forming on the scientist's forehead, the nervous twitching of his knee. He pointlessly taps the sound amplifying device gently, and the resonating high frequency sends a wave of grumbling discomfort though the lecture hall. 

 

But when he starts talking, not a sound in the room is made. His presentation is colourful, his speech captivating, information unprecedented, hand gestures and choice of words nothing short of daring and his eyes spark with fascination.

 

At some point Mako can no longer bring herself to focuse on what he's saying. Her brain seems to have stuck in a loop, playing the same question on repeat

 

_how can any human be so enthralled by **them**_

 

Sha stays silent through the whole speech, face devoid of emotion, keeping everything in like she practiced. The horrible and not so distant memories that try to surface she burries even deeper, concealing them, as she does with true feelings and desires, but not opinions and dignity.

It's a vital skill for a girl like her in a reality like this, especially with the kind of ambitions she has set for herself.

Once Dr. Geiszler proudly finishes on a "But that's yet to be figured out", he turns away from the projection to face his public with a broad grin, quickly casting his eyes away, not ready to meet all the piercing gazes. Head down, the weirdo folds his laser pointer and shoves it in the vest's pocket, breathing in and out a few times, eyes closed, walking back up to the wooden podium stand. As the screen behind goes black, he looks up with a friendly smile, moving as if to say the trivial "Thank you for your attention, you can ask questions now", but falters, buffled at the auditorium's dead silence and the unreadible facial expressions. His own face falls dramatically.

No applause, no amazed murmurs, no disapproving whispers, nothing.

 

Mako can't help but feel sorry for him- _such people have no place amongst soldiers_ \- as he scans the audience frantically, confused and out of place, searching for a way out of the situation. His cheeks are coloured with the realisation that he's no longer welcome here, eyes and body language screaming _'I wanna run away.'_

But Pentecost-sama starts applauding, with no sarcasm or strained disapproval, and everyone follows suit. Mako jolts and joins at some point, embarrassed at herself for having decided to send good manners to hell on this one occasion.

 

The very next day Dr. Geiszler is recruited into the Jaeger Academy's K-sci devision, supervised by Stacker Pentecost himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Try listening to "Lost!" by Coldplay ft. Jay-Z while reading the rest of this :)


	2. Chapter 2

Mako doesn't have the spare time as well as enough unoccupied 'drive space' in her brain to think about it, but whenever she sees that oddfish pass, or give a lecture, or chat with somebody in a hallway, revulsion burns through her; she knows it's wrong, she can't help it.

 

There's just something so _offending_ in Dr. Geiszler, and everybody feels that. 

 

Or maybe it's just her?

 

No, definitely not.

He's arrogant and tactless, a nutcase of a scientist, a fanatic, one step away from being a Kaiju worshipper. That's what they say. That's what she saw in him all those years ago, before he imprinted it in his skin for everybody to see.

 

The Jaeger Academy is everything like an ordinary university or college (save for the fact most students here are taught to fight and kill). Therefore, it's just like in any school: some of her peers adore him as a professor- the way he presents information, the way he assesses their academic performance; some murmur behind his back, call him a freak and skip his classes. 

He's invited to read a xenobiology course once a semester, and since teachers and students all reside in the same campus (PPDC clearly got a thing for social equality), she passed by his room's door once and there were curses painted on it in various languages.

All this eventually came down to an unexpected predicament.

 

"Class dismissed. Mori, Ka-Kachenski? Kachvenski. You two stay put."

Her mind switched back to years at school, where students were called out like that only to be told off and reprimanded for their bad behaviour. Her heart sank, body stiff in momentary panic, as people poured out of the lecture hall, suspicious snickers passing between some of them.

That (approximately) 20 year old broad-shouldered guy in dorky glasses and a size too big plain white T-shirt, the Doctor and her soon became the only ones left. 

"Come down from there, sit," he gestured with his hand towards the seats just in front of him, "I wanna show you something."

The tall student stood up quickly and skipped two steps at a time as he descended from the second highest raw of chairs. Mako followed suit, and they settled on the first raw, one seat apart, just before the large wooden table in the middle of the room.

Dr. Geiszler wasn't the kind to beat around the bush. He set the elbow of his left hand on the table, holding up two papers.

There were raws of numbers on them, which Mako recognised to be the test he had given them the day before. But there were also a few insults written in conspicuous black pen on both papers, in Ukrainian on one, and in clumsy Japanese on the other. By what she could decipher in the hasty handwriting, they were addressed to the lecturer sitting before them.

And, squinting, she saw her name written in the upper right corner.

"You know, I thought all of you are grownups."

Upon saying that he looked directly at her, as if addressing it to her, as if the fact that she's 17 makes her somehow less mature than those knukleheads that wrote this on their test sheets as they were passed down from the higher rows.

She would not tolerate such fallacy.

"Excuse me, Dr. Geiszler, but it wasn't me who did this," she poured as much assurance and steadfastness into the sentence as she could.

"Me neither," the guy next to her piped up, his accent slight, he must have been working on it, but still evident.

"Okay. You telling me someone, what, framed you?" somehow, his facial expression was extremely hard to read and understand.

"In a way-"

"Yes," she was daring him to start scolding her for lying, for shifting the blame, and she could bet it was rude and disrespectful to stare someone down in such a manner; she couldn't care less. She wouldn't be debased by being compared to overgrown bullies, and definitely not by the likes of Dr. Geiszler.

He regarded her with narrowed eyes for a moment, however he didn't seem thoughtful, or mad. The scientist switched between the recruits a few times, jaw moving as if he was chewing on something. His right palm tapped at the table, and the left one still holding the papers moved back and forth, jerkingly, as if subconsciously. After two or three seconds of silence, he shrugged. "Okay. You're free to go."

The Ukrainian seemed to be as surprised as she was. He said 'thank you' and moved to stand up. 

Mako's body moved on autopilot as she rose and followed her groupmate out of the auditorium.

"Oh, by the way! Excellent results. In the test I mean. Both of you." His face was coloured by a pleased broad smile.

Mako was confused and disoriented.

"And, yo, Gleb? Finish this kindergarten faster, I wanna you on my research team, dude. You know your shhii- _stuff_."

He gave them an enthusiastic nod, which Kachvenski returned with a grin and pushed the door open. The man was brought up well, as he stopped in the doorway, holding the door for her. 

Mako's brain seemed to catch up only then, and she bowed to her teacher.

Geiszler noded again, much lower this time, mimicking her bow as much as the table would allow. 

"Good luck, guys!" he shouted after them with sudden cheerfulness.

 

That was the moment she vowed to never judge a book by its cover.


	3. Chapter 3

She walked into the storage vault of the Vladivostok Shatterdome to print out some posters from her favourite magazine without making a fuss in LOCCENT, and was met with a familiar face. 

"Dr. Geiszler?"

" _Holy_ -! Oh hi! Hi. Hi! You startled me- Wow! Wait, wait," he squeezed his eyes shut and raised a finger up, thinking hard. "Mm Mooooru- Mokuu- Mor-"

"It's Mori, sir," Mako was a bit embarrassed to hear a snicker in her voice, but the scientist didn't seem to mind at all.

"Yeah hi! What a surprise!" he didn't stride towards her, to shake hands like people usually do in such situations, instead he moved to put the case with mercuric oxide batteries back on the giant metal shelf.

"Quite a surprise, Doctor," she bowed, because _she_ was polite.

"Call me Newt! I'm not your teacher now, am I," he wiped the dust off his hands by rubbing the sides of his legs, leaving grey smears on the torn dark jeans. _(Torn jeans. The man is over thirty)_

"Apologies, I'm uncomfortable with that," she spoke, pleased at it not sounding like she's actually sorry.

"Oh okay then! Miss Mori," he bowed to her, in the right way, to her surprise: hands in front of his thighs, back in a straight line. Unsurprisingly, it made her respect him even more.

"Have you finished your training?" he asked, while carrying on walking along the shelf, searching for something. She casually followed along, she had a day off, there was no assignment breathing down her neck.

"I haven't yet, I'm stationed here for now, part-time job, kind of, technically still in training."

"What's your job here?" he was genuinely curious, and this leisurely and carefree way he talked encouraged her to relax and just chat. And maybe just boast a little. 

"I monitore a fraction of transfers of Jaeger parts from Asia to Anchorage and Los Angeles."

"Wow! Sounds awesome! Though also hella boring." He was forthright to such an extent where she wondered just how he managed to live up to that point with his teeth intact. She chuckled though, not once offended.

"It is, a little. But it needs to be done by somebody, why not me."

"Dreams don't work unless you do, ha?"

Mako raised a brow, lowering the corners of her mouth in an impressed expression. "Mind if I write that down?"

He snickered halfheartedly. As she fished her phone out of the large seemingly bottomless pocket of her overcoat, Newton froze.

"Seriously? Jeez, you're serious." 

"I always do that, don't worry."

"Oh okay, sorry! Cause I thought it's just that you were this much impressed, even tho I picked it up somewhere on the Web, but okay I guess."

He was emoting, she knew, and laughed at his insulted posture and voice and the way he turned away from her, as if they were children in a theatrical play. 

"Okay, yeah, look, you're not too busy right? Could you aid me here, I'm kinda bad with these things. Eyesight and.. other stuff."

"Sure!"


	4. Chapter 4

They'd been meeting a lot, in different PPDC facilities and international conferences. They were appointed on several projects together, and, not without bumps and hiccups, it worked out fine. They had found common ground eventually. 

He quickly became the highest-ranking specialist, a vital person for the Corps. His signature was indispensable on all official documents and reports concerning Kaiju, some of his books became part of the Academy curriculum, and each Event he would be called to consult the Jaeger team during combat.

It was impressive. And quite unexpected and irritating for some particular individuals, too.

But to those who knew him in person he was more than a typical mad scientist, last resort in time of need. As eccentric as he was, his struggles were real, his mental issues were no joke. Contrary to what most thought, he could be attentive, and patient, and thoughtful, when he wanted to. Contrary to what most thought, he could be hurt easily.

And the unbounded adoration he felt towards his field of study was as disturbing as it was inspiring.

He was often blunt, blinded by his ambitions and passions; he got in trouble, and he got out of them swiftly and unscathed (usually). He carried on driving some people mad by his mere existence in their lives, feeding off their confidence in his fiasco, letting it drive him to success.

At some point she started seeing him as her equal- was it her own growth, or the development of their mutual understanding, she couldn't know. He was so open-minded and easygoing, one simply forgot to remember such unimportant things as age and status, and those matter even less in a world in disarray. 

Friendship with him stopped being such a weird concept, but became the state of things, the one she was quite comfortable with. 

He never cursed around her, never put her into awkward or uncomfortable situations, unless they both found themselves in one. She'd be the passive listener when he needed it, she'd ask for his help with Deutsche, she'd let herself get dragged outside to get some fresh air.

Overtime, Mako found herself using the nickname, earning a thanks and an explanation.

"I just don't like the way they say my surname. Officials and all that nonsense. It.. sounds awful to me now, it's like being bossed around. Also it's like.. they don't know me, right? They use my full name cause it's in the papers and dossiers and stuff. It'd be weird if my friends kept calling me by my full name, you know? I've got one who does, but he's a quirky dude, don't be like him, God, please."

He grinned as she chuckled. Mako realised that there was always depth to things, much more than meets the eye.


	5. Chapter 5

 She's come to know Newt from head to toe over the years. She knows he feels fulfilled and amused when he makes other people laugh. She lets herself loose and laughes at his jokes freely when they are hanging out together. His face would lit up with happiness and he would grin broadly, looking at her like she is the sun. 

Be it a few hour's long walk into whatever city was near, or a day on the road (sneaking away had it's repercussions, but the adrenaline rush upon going rogue was unforgettable), she'd have the time of her life, all the stress and anxiety pouring out with tears of joy (and other kinds of tears, too).

They talked a lot. About their 'previous lives', about dreams, people, religion, rollercoasters, tea or coffee, fanta or coke; about the absurdity of giant robots, about the diversity of life on Earth, the purpose of it all, too, of course; about death, music, cinema, modern trends, economics and sweets..

 

Knowing, really knowing Newt Geiszler granted a ticket into a completely different way of seeing the world.


	6. Chapter 6

During crisis it's always important to celebrate something as trivial as Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, or Shunbun no Hi; to keep doing weddings and birthday parties, to keep giving presents. It is important to live to the fullest, as much as they can afford, so that they don't get absorbed by war, forgetting what they fight for.

 

It was when the Corps' budget was cut significantly that this tradition came into existence. 

Once a month, usually in the middle of it, the part of the Shatterdome personnel who had established tight rapport would celebrate birthdays of all those among them who were born that month. 

Ultimately, birthdays got tied to holidays, for example those born in January and December got their 'cakes' and wishes on New Year. 

Being adults, none of them minded. Being soldiers, they didn't complain. Being on the battlefront, they sought cause for joy wherever they could.

 

So Mako, Pentecost-sama and Newt celebrated their birthday on the 1st of January. Though, the Marshall didn't exactly _celebrate_ , and not many people actually knew when his birtday was.

Those who didn't get to go home for the holiday raised toasts and turned on loud music, bought as well as cooked unusual snacks.

But Mako was always away from the racket of it all. Cause at some point Newt made it his objective to make each one of their New Years into true holidays. 

 

They'd be sitting on the pier, with vanilla ice creams in their hands, admiring the gorgeous fireworks painting the Sydney Opera House and the plain facade of the Anti-Kaiju Wall into vivid colours.


	7. Chapter 7

She remembers when she was nineteen, resolute and proud of herself for achieving success in such unfavourable circumstancees, ready to move forward to finally get what she desires most. Yet some part of her was still an ordinary teenager, and that part had it's own worries on mind.

 

There was a moment when one of those worries appeared out of nowhere, and shocked her and knocked her off balance, so much that she couldn't concentrate on her work all day. Not being able to carry on like this, she gathered her courage and hot-headedness and, after working hours, went to Newt with an outright question.

"I need you to be honest with me and tell me if you love me."

Mako couldn't help but pour all of her disgust at the idea of being someone's romantic interest, especially of a person who's almost 20 years her senior, into her expression and voice, while being absolutely terrified of an affirmative answer from her best friend. He never once flirted with anyone when she was around, and they did hang out a lot, and God knows, maybe..

She felt emotions pump through her veins, and she could afford it- when she's in Newt's company she can be free, no repressing her feelings so that to look tough, he knows she's strong and ' _more amazing than any anime warrior girl_ '...

A lump in her throat formed at his continuous lack of reaction, and he was, after all, one of the most vivid examples of the 'talk first, think later' kind.

He didn't laugh, though in one of the scenarios she expected him to. He didn't ask "what" or "why would I" or "where did that come from" etc. in that  squeaky, loud, high-pitched tone of his. Didn't make a joke, didn't tease her. And didn't crumble, devasted. He just stared her right in the eyes. For a long time. She could feel sweat forming on her forehead. 

A small smile appeared, as he finished reading her after what seemed to be hours to her with the speed her thoughts raced. He put down the retractor, then skilfully pulled the turqose coloured bloody gloves off and walked around the surgical table; her heart sank as he came almost too close to her.

Newton stopped, rocked on his feet back and forth slightly, his chin turned just an inch upwards, that sweet kind smile still gracing his lips. 

He cautiously stepped forward, and her breath hitched as he wrapped her in a tight hug.

Before her mind could go into overdrive he sighed, as if composing himself to speak, and said, "You're like my little sister. And I do love you. But only in this way... and I don't- don't really think I'm capable of loving in any other. You know?"

"Yeah, yeah," Mako heard herself breathe out, melting in the hug. She wrapped her arms around him, feeling the heat of his skin through the 'Black Velvet Rabbits' t-shirt and a plaid yellow-red shirt that he wore over it. She had thought she might cry from relief after getting a negative answer, but now she was simply overcome with a feeling of tranquility. "Yes, I understand," she said into his shoulder.

"Yeah, it's cool. And I mean- isn't it awesome? That I just don't have to worry about falling in love with somebody? It's just so awful, I mean-"

Mako started laughing- at the grotesque voice he said that with, or at the teasing phrasing, it didn't matter- cutting him off; and as they parted, still laughing, in the middle of an almost empty lab of Panama City's Shatterdome, all the worries seemed to evaporate at once.

They clumsily bumped fists, as they _never_ do, but did then only to laugh some more, and for a second, it felt like the two of them could take on all the monsters in the world.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Any form of feedback is deeply appreciated ♡


End file.
